Ep. 200 Neal Foard…From Madison Avenue to Viral Storytelling

In the 200th episode of The Kindness Chronicles, the hosts welcome back storyteller and former advertising executive Neal Ford to discuss how his ad career shaped his focus on emotionally resonant communication and how a viral TikTok story launched his social media storytelling. Neal recounts a 1969 experience when strangers helped his family after a car breakdown near Bakersfield, restoring his father’s faith in people and later reframing it with the moon landing. The conversation explores skepticism about performative “kindness videos,” the value of anonymous giving, and examples of quietly impactful generosity. They discuss social media’s role in spreading either cynicism or connection, how technology and algorithms can be weaponized, and a positive AI example from IKEA retraining staff. The hosts highlight Minnesota Masonic Charities’ Selfless Scholar program and Neal’s StoryFire.net course, including an AI coaching component and his talk, “The ROI of Kindness.”

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Every agency on Madison Avenue is defined by the moment they got their car.

SPEAKER_03 0:05

When we land Jaguar, the world will know we've arrived.

SPEAKER_00 0:27

Welcome to the 200th episode of the Kindness Chrome Cold, where once again we hope to inject the world with a dose of the Minnesota kindness that it desperately needs. We've got one of our favorite guests back on. He has become a kindness icon for us. We Steve spends way too much time on LinkedIn sending these videos to us. It gets very irritating because we do have jobs and we have things. So do I.

SPEAKER_02 0:57

That's why I'm on there.

SPEAKER_00 0:58

And I but I just I want to uh welcome Steve. Hello, how are you?

SPEAKER_02 1:04

I'm I'm I'm excited to be here.

SPEAKER_00 1:05

Jeff is back here uh in his uh drummer's seat. Super excited. And uh we have our special guest for our 200th episode, Mr.

SPEAKER_02 1:13

Neil Ford, who's uh well before we bring him out, I just want to say yes, I'm I'm on LinkedIn on uh LinkedIn quite a bit, and there's a lot of junk, there's a lot of sales, there's a lot of stuff. But when I see this gentleman's post, I stop and listen and check it out and enjoy it in every way. So uh for our guest who maybe didn't hear us before, hear hear our guest with us before in the past, he is returning to our show after one of our favorite guests from 2024. He's one of my all-time favorite guests. He's a former global uh creative executive, an incredibly effective storyteller, and might I say entertainer, and someone who challenges the way we think about people, connection, and what actually matters. Last time we had a fun and insightful conversation. Today we'd like to see if we go a little deeper. Neil Ford, welcome back to the Kindness Chronicles today.

SPEAKER_03 2:03

Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_02 2:04

Um you guys are waves, aren't you? I'm so cool. We'd be invited back. Well, uh, we got number 200 here, so we're excited about that. We're in Minnesota and it's actually getting warm, so that gets us all very exciting.

SPEAKER_00 2:16

Warm as in it's 50 degrees today. That's that's warm.

SPEAKER_01 2:20

We'll take what we can get at this point.

SPEAKER_00 2:21

Yeah, Neil, you're in Los Angeles. Yeah, yeah. You probably have a different definition of warm out there.

SPEAKER_03 2:27

Yeah, mine's a little bit like Tuscany.

unknown 2:31

Damn it.

SPEAKER_00 2:32

So let's talk, uh let's talk a little bit. I was just in Tuscany, by the way. Wow, look at you. Very fancy. I know. Look at me. Um, something that I'm I'm very curious about. You know, we have become consumers of your uh of your product uh over the year, uh, the last several years. And how did this all start for you? You were an ad exec for what was the name of Sochi Sochi and Sochi in New York. Tell us a little bit about how you got into the ad business. Did you ever get your car? Did you ever get the big uh car campaign? And then uh how this has evolved into what you're doing today.

SPEAKER_03 3:10

Yeah, actually, I was part of the original Lexus launch team. There you go.

SPEAKER_00 3:13

Lexus launch team.

SPEAKER_03 3:15

Yeah, I was uh the team one advertising launched Lexus in the US, and I was employee number three. So um, it was it was a glorious opportunity to see how that happens right from ground zero right on into the into the future. But uh the journey that you're talking about, like how did I come to do the videos that I do and tell the stories that I do? And it is all interconnected with advertising. My specialty at Saatchi and Saatchi was that I used to teach young creative people how to present their work better because it's a funny thing, like any industry, when you are manufacture something or you create something, you assume that everybody else is going to be able to see the genius of it because you can see it. And that is an incorrect assumption. You know, this that's the nature of why advertising matters, why it exists, is because it isn't enough to just shove a product in front of somebody. They have to understand it, they have to understand it the way you understand it. You have to frame it for them so they'll see its value that's beyond just the nuts and the bolts and so on. You know, and ultimately, what all of the really great advertising would do is it made a kind of promise. And I don't mean a warranty style promise. I mean it was this is who I am, and I understand you, the customer. If the better I understand you, the more you as a customer feel seen and appreciated, like I'm not gonna let you down, um, the more you're going to be able to uh win a premium price because people get more than just the nuts and the bolts and the ability to go from one place to another. Car advertising in particular is very important and influential on the ultimate price that people are willing to pay for a product. Because if you compare certain products, you know, bolts to bolts, uh the objective criterion, this many miles per gallon, that amount of safety, this amount of styling, you know, most of them fall pretty close to one another. But you know, when you infuse something with an with a certain animus, that's the the Greeks would have this word that meant the sort of spirit inside the machine, a kind of spirit in an inanimate object. You guys like probably have, say, a favorite coffee cup. And every time you look at it, I mean, objectively, the coffee will be held just as well by some other cup, but your cup, the one that you like, has some kind of animus. It has a sort of spirit to it. It contains within it all the memories and all of the reasons why you originally acquired it, or maybe it was a gift and so on. So, our job as advertisers was to try to frame things in such a way that you would feel listened to and heard and cared about and important. And it always astonished me at how difficult that was to persuade clients to do. Because clients are so proud of their product. What they want to do is they want to just list its attributes. They want to just basically do bullet points in an ad. And if they've got 30 seconds, their instinct is to fill all 30 seconds with, well, I've got three more seconds, so I'm going to give you two more bullet points. Yeah, that's a local car dealer ad. Not understanding that that's not how people take in information, it's not how they remember it, it's not how it affects them emotionally. Well, so after all of these years of trying to convince clients to do work that was emotionally resonant and that would make customers feel like they've just seen or read a love letter to them. And after trying to teach young creative people how to make sure that their ideas get the best possible jury verdict, um, I wound up leaving advertising. And my daughter actually suggested that I start telling the stories I would tell her about my family. She suggested I put them onto social media. And we were we were in a uh breakfast restaurant. This was about the third video that I did. And she suggested I post it to TikTok. And while we were having pancakes, in the space of the time it took breakfast to be served, it had like 200,000 views. What? And and she says, Dad, I think you just went viral. Yeah. And I, you know, I didn't know anything about what it took to be viral, but over the course of the day, we had more than a million views. And then over the course of that week, we it totaled up to something on the order of five million. And you know what it was, guys? It was I I know you would understand why it did as well as it did, because it was a reminiscence about my father, and how he had how his opinion of the human race had soured dramatically. This was in 1969. And why it was relevant was in 1969, the country was at war with itself. The Vietnam War was raging, the draft was happening, people were going off to Vietnam. The the there was you know, Helter Skelter and the Manson family killings and the Zodiac killer, and there were you know, civil rights was or they were causing riots, and you know, there was unfairness. I mean, it was a if people think it was bad now, right? They have no sense of history. Yeah, because it was unreal, the amount of terror and disagreement, and you know, the Klan was active in a in a really major way. So what happened over the course of that story was that my father and I broke down our car in uh south of Bakersfield in the middle of a California Central Valley summer.

SPEAKER_00 8:56

Yeah, he's telling this story. Love this story. Love this story.

SPEAKER_03 8:59

Yeah, and so we were we were broken down. This was before cell phones, this was long before call boxes on the highway, and we're about nine miles south of Bakersfield, and on a Sunday, we didn't know what the hell we were gonna do. And the worst part was my dad didn't have any money on him. All he had was a chevron card. That's the only thing he had. His plan was we were gonna go from LA to Oakland on this chevron card. Well, you know, we don't know quite what we're gonna do, but the hood on the cup car was up. So this young cowboy in a flatbed rolls by and he offers to give us some help. Hey, fellas, you need a rat into town? Maybe I can tow you. So my dad says, Well, you know, I can't pay you. And the guy says, Well, I wasn't gonna charge you. So he hooks us up to his bumper literally with electrical conduit. Now, this was a 1960 Oldsmobile, so this thing was basically a tank, and you could you could have attached that thing to a door handle and it would still drag the car into town. So we roll into town. By the way, a little footnote the guy had a tube radio in his truck, which I just thought was the most amazing thing. So we get into town, and because it's Sunday, the mechanics shop isn't open, so we literally bust him out of church to go help us. We put the car up on the jacks, the the guy realizes he doesn't have the part, so now we have to go down to the local Napa Parts place, which isn't open on Sunday. So we got to go to his house. We get him out of his house. The whole time, my dad's saying, you know, I can't pay you, fellas. I can't pay you. All I got is this chevron card. And everybody's kind of doing some version of don't worry, we'll work it out. Finally, we get to, you know, the the part is there, and my dad says, Okay, okay, we're just gonna have to get this settled, fellas. How are we gonna work this out? Because all I've got is this card. And the cowboy, they're all looking at each other funny, and the cowboy says, Look at it, it makes you feel better. I got a bunch of watermelons, I gotta get up a rail spur. If you'll help me load these watermelons, I'm it's probably gonna be about five loads. I'll pay for the part if that'll make any difference. My dad goes, Great, that'll get us going. So my dad and I are in this rail car on a Sunday, and it was supposed to be a refrigerated car, but the thing broke, so we he was really lucky to have us. We got all these things unloaded, and it must have been 160 degrees in that thing. Oh, Jesus. I mean, it was sauna. So so we are sweating like pigs, but my dad's just whistling the whole time because he's like, Okay, good, we're you know, we're making our way. Progress, yeah. So, finish it all up. We're covered in sweat and grime. Car comes running up, running like a top, and my dad says, You know, fellas, I really don't quite know how to thank you. I really appreciate it. And we're turning to go. And uh the Napa Auto Parts guy goes, Whoa, whoa, where do you think you're going? Uh oh. And all of a sudden my dad stiffens like a leopard, like, oh, I'm not selling the kid if that's what this is about. And and then uh the guy says, No, no, no, my wife's gonna make us all Sunday dinner. If you come around, we'll you and the kid can get a shower and maybe some clean shirts, and we'll have dinner together. So we had fried chicken from the chicken right over there, and we had corn on the cob from the corn just up the road. And I had my first beer at nine. Oh, at nine.

SPEAKER_00 12:15

There you go. Might as well get started.

SPEAKER_03 12:18

And it was, you know, you had to tap it with the church key, but it was like the old timing. Sure, you know. So the whole time during this dinner, my dad isn't saying much, but he just keeps doing this. And I know my dad, so I know what this means. He just keeps doing this. Oh boy, and what he's thinking is I can't believe how how suspicious I was of these people.

SPEAKER_00 12:39

Yeah, yeah, isn't that something?

SPEAKER_03 12:41

They didn't deserve it, they didn't earn that suspicion. So, you know, it all comes to an end, and we're full, and we've got cowboy shirts on, and uh we work, you know, we get the mailing addresses, my dad's gonna send them all a check, and we head back in the car, it's one of those summer nights, we got all the windows down, you know, and we get back to Oakland. My dad must not said about four or five words on that whole trip. But when we got back, I've gone to bed, and just before my dad turns out the light, he's looking at me in the doorway, and he goes, Hey, no matter what you read in the papers, no matter what you see in the movies or on the news or what you read in magazines, listen to me. That's how people really are. And then the epilogue of the story is about a month later, Neil Armstrong landed on the moon. Wow. And it it just changed everything about my father's view of everything.

SPEAKER_00 13:40

Isn't that something?

SPEAKER_03 13:41

Now, that story really resonated with a lot of people because they were reminded in 2024 at the time that when that video appeared, they were reminded, you know, you all everybody always thinks their time is the crisis time, that theirs is the worst time, that things have never been this bad, or we've never been at each other's throats like this before. And there is a little truth to that, because it's in the weaponized technologies. But when people saw that video, they were reminded of something that they needed reminding of, which is even when it was that bad, people were still pretty cool. The mulk the bulk of them. And I was just up in Minneapolis, maybe about two months ago. I was doing a clinic for some people at the Totino Grace High School.

SPEAKER_00 14:31

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:32

And and man, I was surrounded on all sides by the loveliest Minnesotans. And you guys would have to admit that Minnesota came out of that whole crisis quite proud of itself and proud of each other. And Minnesotans showed who they really were. And you know, it sometimes takes a little bit of friction to show you just the way people are, really.

SPEAKER_02 15:04

Yeah. Yeah. And uh, you know, those those rallies, uh, people don't realize I don't know if we talked about this before, but those that couple huge, huge rallies they had in January, that was 20 below zero out there. Yeah, it was really, really cold. And so that you know, a testament to the people in our our area. It's amazing. Um, so this kind of leads me that your story leads me to something I've been thinking about. I want to see what you think of this. And we talk about there's a lot of videos, uh LinkedIn, Facebook, whatever, all over the place, of people that are revealing uh kind people to do kind acts, like someone will uh this guy in Canada and this other couple people they'll be out front of a store, they'll be missing shoes, and they'll they'll stop somebody and say, Hey, do you mind if you can help me? And you know, they give 10 people that say no, and then one person says yes, and it's a whole process. And once they listen to their story, once they talk, um it really digs into a really deserving person that he turns it around and stuff. What do you think of that performative aspect of kindness and and kind of exactly to the root of what you're saying? It's the same theme, but it's not as it's very performative. The cameras are there, I kind of have some problems with it, but I think in the end it still makes you feel great to see it. But I have a little suspicion, I'm always kind of the suspicious one about all that stuff because I know what it takes to go into production and do a camera and you know, the intentions behind everyone. What are your thoughts when you see a lot of those kind of videos?

SPEAKER_03 16:35

Well, let's let's look at it in the uh as a part of a mosaic of what people take in, you know, from in their media. And it's a little bit like a Sunday service. I mean, the one you describe is a little bit like listening to the parable of the the Good Samaritan.

SPEAKER_00 16:52

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 16:53

Now, if you look into the in the Jewish Bible, the uh the not the Torah specifically, but the um oh gee, the Talmud, um they talk about the graduated levels of you know how God looks at kindnesses, like uh especially donations or charity. And the absolute best kind of charity, according to their teaching, is the one where uh this is the one that God smiles on most, is the one where the person doesn't know who it came from, and the person who gave it doesn't know who it's going to.

SPEAKER_00 17:30

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 17:31

And the reason is that it's it's it preserves a person's dignity because they're not getting charity. Oh, and by the way, I forgot that's number two is they don't know who gave it and they don't know who they who received it. Uh the number one is you haven't just helped someone by giving them charity, you have given them a hand up so that they can get out of their circumstances. And go ahead, your best.

SPEAKER_00 18:01

I was just saying, we we we talk about this often, and you know, one of the things that that I'm sort of an advocate for is you know, why let authenticity get in the way of a great story? If it's a great story that that moves you in a particular way, I really don't care, but what drives me nuts is when there are these stories that are out there that make you feel real good, and of course I have to read the comments, and immediately people, the ones that have the most shoot it down and they shoot it down and they say, Oh, this is all set up like take Mr. Beast. Mr. Beast is a perfect example. I mean, if there's been a person who has been able to monetize what you're describing, it's Mr. Beast. But, you know, in the grand scheme of things, people love, I mean, based on the fact that he's got billions of downloads, people love to consume that stuff. But to your point, the fact that for that to happen, it has to show a person that's in need, and it almost kind of capitalizes on that person's need, and it sort of takes away the dignity of things. Yes, you know, the purest form of philanthropy, as you've described, is one where you know you give it to, you know, we're involved in philanthropy, uh, you know, the the Masonic Children's Hospital. You know, we give money to the Masonic Children's Hospital. We don't know who uh you know who it goes to. We don't choose who it goes to and we don't care because we know that and they don't know who it's coming from, right? Yeah, other than the fact that our name is on the building. I mean, that always helps. But um, you know, I I I just you know to me there there's a level of skepticism that sort of undermines the the purpose behind those stories. Right.

SPEAKER_03 19:48

And uh to your point, yeah, no doubt, no doubt. Some people really are they're they're doing kindness porn. They're kindness porn, yes. They're producing it for their own ends. But look, on balance, I'd rather have that than Andrew Tate out in the world basically pimp true, you know, and have young men imitating him. I I don't get that, but there it is. And I believe that whenever you are suspicious about somebody doing the right thing because you suspect that it's all performative and it's for their gain, that ironically is the side of sort of thing that that pushes people in the direction of an Andrew Tate. Because they grow cynical that there is that real kindness is not genuine. There really aren't people like that. There's no such thing as an innocent or you know what I mean. So again, to return to this theme of really kindness is on behalf of your fellow human. What they really amount to, if they're I believe in my own belief system is there, but for the grace of God go you. And you don't you should never look down your nose at someone who is unfortunately struggling because that could be you. And to donate in such a way where it's I'm not doing this to take credit for it, ironically enough, that will make you feel better than being celebrated. I've experienced it both ways, and it is the coolest thing in the world. I here's what I saw a friend of mine do. He uh he came into some money because he sold a company and it was a lot of money. And he started kind of going around doing nice things for people. And what he he he knew a substitute teacher at this school, and he said, Hey, uh who at your school would benefit most from a financial windfall? And this substitute said, Well, there's a bunch of people that need it. And so what he wound up doing was going to the administrators of the school and setting up not a trust, but it was some kind of little financial thing. Um So that so that they could do a kind of monthly boost off of this guy's nickel. And he he never revealed his name. It was just some it was just a citizen saying, I think what you're doing is worthwhile. And he got such a kick out of all the mechanics of setting it up so that he wouldn't be known. The kind of behind the scenes where he actually he enjoyed it more setting up the little labyrinth so that you'd never know who it came from.

SPEAKER_02 22:28

Is he the same gentleman that celebrated his birthday with you? And and uh man, I want to hang out with that guy. What a what a fun opportunity, you know, with the waitress. And oh my god, he just he he gives out. Did you hear that story too? Same guy.

SPEAKER_01 22:42

It's not the guy with the little trolls, is it? No, no. Okay, okay. I love that story too.

SPEAKER_03 22:47

I'll do a very quick version of the story. Yeah. This this friend of mine, he was he was in tech, and like a lot of people in tech, you know, most people in tech don't they're not success stories. It's you know they're they're the they're the debris on the beach. Yeah, but and I didn't even understand what he made, but what happened was just when COVID struck, Zoom and Microsoft Teams and all these things needed uh they see they had to have a kind of a plug-in to optimize their data streaming and stuff. And he had a product that did that, and so they got into a bidding war for his tech that they could just integrate and he would and they bought it, and it was you know, it was it was very much in the high seven figures, so um, or in the high eight figures. So, anyway, he uh says to me one day, hey, you know, uh, can you help me move some stuff? And he this guy had been, you know, just barely keeping the lights on for the better part of 10 years. And so I go, Yeah, absolutely, I can help you move some stuff. So he takes up at his old Honda. We're both dressed in these old shirts, you know, these old ratted out. I call them my refrigerator moving clothes. We we go into the restaurant, he says, Do me a favor, let me do the ordering. Okay. So we uh he says, Hey, listen, what can we get for under five bucks? to the waitress. And she goes, Oh, you guys working today? And he goes, Yeah. And she goes, Oh, okay. Well, let me see what I can find. She comes back out, she's got eggs and bacon and toast and juice and and two muffins in a to-go bag and coffee. And my friend goes, I don't, I don't think we can pay for this. And she goes, Oh, well, I got the order wrong, so just pay what you can. So, okay, so we're kind of, I'm going, this is all very strange. Well, he what he does is before we leave, he leaves this big manila envelope on the table, this thick envelope on the table. And then we go out to the car and we stay in the car and we're looking through the window. Oh, okay. And he watches her open this envelope. And what he'd done was he'd opened a trust for she and her husband. They were co-owners of this little greasy spoon, and there was an ATM card in there. And the note basically said, All you gotta do is you just fill out the paperwork, and this is this trust belongs to you as the trustee. And it was a chunk of money. I mean, the way I described the story is it wasn't money, it was freedom. Wow, yeah, you know, that's how much it was. Sure.

SPEAKER_02 25:17

And he he knew them because he stopped the nerve a lot, right? So he used to set up ahead of time.

SPEAKER_03 25:21

He said that she used to feed him like that all the lean years. Wow. And and was always giving him way more than he could pay for. And so he finally was gonna make good on that.

SPEAKER_00 25:33

I mean, that is that's the stuff of that's the that those are the kind of movies we need to have made.

SPEAKER_03 25:38

Yeah, and and you know, he invited me along. He knew I would get a huge kick out of that. Sure. And that was not that was not the last stop we made that day, by the way. Jeez, the crazy next stop was his ex-wife, who they had divorced years earlier because they just couldn't make it work, they were on such a shoestring, and he felt like she deserved some of the windfall. Ex-wife, and and um, but this is what he said. So I go, I'm like, he's telling me all about the money and you know how how he came by it, and I'm laughing. And I go, I what I don't understand what I'm doing here. Like, you told me you needed to what what's the what are we supposed to move? And he goes, You don't think this is moving?

SPEAKER_00 26:25

Oh my god. Well done. So cool, so fun. What a what a so so just curiously, uh, was this did he have children with this ex-wife? No, I mean that it was one of those that's it was one of those things.

SPEAKER_03 26:40

They were both engineers, okay. Um, you know, she got a she got a job offer and they split up because of territory, and um it wasn't, you know, the thing with the important thing was it wasn't acrimonious, they just couldn't make it work.

SPEAKER_01 26:56

And uh wow, it was such a lovely thing for him to will you just tell us stories for the next hour or can I can I I have a a prompt prompt for him because I was listening to the your last episode and and Neil, one of your recent videos talked about your dad about reading the oldest books because he's and and you had made a mention about your daughter and son didn't really get a chance to meet him, but your stories are a way to kind of keep his memory alive.

SPEAKER_03 27:24

Yeah, so you know uh the my my father's remark. I I used to go to my dad, you know, like when like anybody who was just starting out in business, I'm filled with energy and enthusiasm and that that strange spirit where you feel like you know something and everybody else doesn't know. And I had just picked up, I think it was uh I think it was in search of excellence. So this tells you how long ago it was. It was Tom Peters' book, yeah, you know, from like 1981 or something. And I I said, Oh, you gotta read this book. This is amazing. And my father said, Hey, do yourself a favor, read old books. Okay, because there's nothing new under the sun. And when you're what you're gonna find out by reading an old book, like Dostoevsky or or Marcus Aurelius or Herodotus or Mark Twain or is that anything over a hundred years old and there's something in it that's still true, that will always be true. And what that gives you is a foundation of knowing, you know, that you're merely one of a long line of people that make the same mistakes. And it is true that we as a generation are subject to the very same things that happened to our generations before us, which is we think that because we've got GPS and MRI machines and smartphones, and we think we are smarter than previous generations. We're not, and and we also think we're wiser than the young kids coming along now. Like the example that I use was I was in the gym listening to some blowhard tell me nobody wants to work anymore. And I said, you know who else used to say that? The freaking Romans, absolutely. Don't tell me, don't tell me anything's changed. But the reason I called attention to that, and the reason that it caught your attention was the idea that look, human beings don't change, and because they don't change, human nature doesn't change. So anything that was bad about us all those centuries back, and anything that's good about us all those centuries back, those are both present today. So the the nice quality of Minnesotans, it was there from the people that came over on the boat. And you know what else though? The people that brought us slavery and sweatshops and child labor, they're here with us today.

SPEAKER_00 29:54

They are still here too. You bet they are.

SPEAKER_03 29:56

Yeah, but you know what gives me some hope is over the sweep of time, the people that the the those Minnesota folks, there's they're gonna win in the end.

SPEAKER_00 30:10

They kind of always do. They always do, and they always have. And you know people talk about the social media being the scourge on society. And, you know, just as social media can be the source of terrible social angst, and you know, you know, frankly, there's a lot of garbage out there. I also think it's like one of the most powerful tools for spreading stories, like your story, your 1969 story. Those things still exist today. I mean, Minnesotans are famous for if you see somebody stuck in the snow, you'll see half a dozen cars pull over and push that car out of the snow. And, you know, they don't expect anything in return. They do it, you know, what you know what they get in return is they get that oxytocin. Yeah. And the cars that drive by that don't stop, but just happen to witness it, they also get a dose of oxytocin. I mean, it's it's there's goodness out there. And when social media, when those moments are captured and put on film, and it's not meant to be done to monetize, and it's not meant by, you know, put out there by some social influencer. It just happenstance. Like, like take your story, for example. I mean, nobody knew who Neil Ford was, you know, in in the social media world. All of a sudden you post a story and they tell two friends and they tell two friends and so on and so on.

SPEAKER_02 31:39

I mean, that's really how that all it's the content, uh obviously, but it's also Neil, it's the way you tell it, and it was delivered in such a way that it was comfortable to hear, and you you you found a you found an opening for people, and that's I think that's uh a testament to your storytelling capability.

SPEAKER_00 31:57

And before we spoke, before we we started hitting the record button, I said something to the effect of that when I listened to Neil talk, he's just got this this presentation that makes me melt. I think I said I I wet my pants because I get so relaxed. That was a weird thing to say. That was a very weird thing. Then I said it again, and this time it was while we were recording. But you know, the the the importance of storytelling, I think, is just you know, the the the stories that that we're telling today or the story that you told about 1969, those stories need to to to to be told over and over again. And I do think that you know, YouTube and TikTok, those are places where if you want to consume that stuff, your algorithms are gonna hammer you with that stuff. You know, I've suddenly I just have to, I always I get stuck in these algorithm ruts.

SPEAKER_01 32:48

One of the lessons I was digging into your product, which is storyfire.net, right, Neil? Storyfire.net. We'll put a link up there. But it I think one of the reasons you're uh one of the lessons and one of the things that makes stories authentic the way we like them that aren't staged, you teach about just don't be the hero of your own story, talk about someone else. You know, the that was something I took away and I thought that's why we like Steve Hartman, that's why we like Neil Ford, because you're talking about other people and you're you're painting a picture.

SPEAKER_03 33:23

Steve Hartman is a really, really good example of a man with a perfect life. Yes. And I don't I don't mean that he doesn't have problems. I'm sure Steve has problems now and again. But look at what he does as a career and as a person. His whole his whole evangel is to spread encouragement and to give you a little faith that it it might work out and that the people that are around you are not necessarily bad. You know, you probably have heard this joke. Am I allowed to curse on the show or probably not? Go ahead. Just show Fs.

SPEAKER_00 33:56

Let's keep the F's out.

SPEAKER_03 33:58

Okay. So there's this very famous sort of uh it's attributed to no one, but it goes like this. It's the sort of um, yeah, oh man, I made a Freudian slip the other night. Oh, I meant to say to my wife, uh, please pass the salt, and it came out. You ruined my life, you bitch. Oops. Now, why would anybody have that kind of slip? It's because of this. Because over time, inch by inch, brick by brick, tension and stress has been building from a thousand little irritations and things until they the dam broke. Now, it's really important that we pay attention to somebody like a Steve Hartman or like you guys, because that is the antidote to the pressure and the negativity that builds up into road rage, that builds up into um doing awful things to people. You know, I when you consider those guys that shot um that guy in in Minneapolis.

SPEAKER_00 35:14

Oh, those ice agents that shot Predy, the the nurse?

SPEAKER_03 35:17

Yeah, Alex Predy. Those they didn't arrive on the scene as a normal human being. They arrived on the scene uh that having having lived a certain experience that put them in a mood that that was appropriate. In the time, they didn't think they did anything wrong, because in their universe, all of the things they consumed was probably poison. They took in poison and they took in threats and they were terrified and they were they were frightened, they were insecure, they were angry, and you know, that is the nature of propaganda. Yeah, that's what what what you do, what I do, it's still propaganda. Yep. But what we're but what we're trying to do is we're trying to scrub this whiteboard clean. We're trying to bathe people in something that's going to lower their tensions. We're trying to reassure them that the person next to them, you know, in line is not somebody to be angry at, but rather to strike up a conversation with. And you know, there's a there's a funny thing about how social media has been working. And it's very unfortunate. What it does is my my my father passed away a long time ago, but he used to say the problem with technology is that every time you invent something new, the first impulse somebody has is to turn it into a weapon. And we come along with our algorithms and our AI and so forth. And what is the first thing people figure out how to do with it? How to steal, how to divide, how to surveil. Like that's what they use it for. The reason Facebook is free is because you're the product.

SPEAKER_00 37:06

You bet.

SPEAKER_03 37:07

So when you think about it, what is what has happened is that even though human beings haven't changed, and the vast bulk of us are pretty cool if you give us a chance. Just like you say, you pull you you get stuck in the snow in a Minnesota winter, and the next thing you know, you've got five guardian angels. That's most people. But 1.4% of the population is psychopaths. And you've given these monkeys a flamethrower.

SPEAKER_01 37:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:38

Because technology scales. Wow, so all of us.

SPEAKER_00 37:43

To be fair, you know, I just we try really hard not to go down the political rabbit hole. And when the ice situation took place here, we we purposely tried to avoid conversations about this because it is so divisive.

SPEAKER_03 38:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:01

And, you know, my biggest concern about, you know, the the biggest issues, the 1.4% of the population are serving in Congress right now. You know, I mean, on both sides. And, you know, you talk about weaponizing social media. Anytime that there is a uh a congressional hearing, they're just looking for sound bites. They're looking for an opportunity to be heard, to be seen. And it's never, I mean, what's crazy is I find that the most the most reasonable person in Congress right now is probably the guy that had a stroke before he was elected as senator in Pennsylvania. Because Fetterman. He goes at it from a very pragmatic perspective. I don't think he likes his party. I know he doesn't like the Republican Party, but the the the point is when the situation that took place here in Minneapolis, the biggest issue with that was you had people out there with their cameras on both sides chronicling terrible behavior from the ice agents and chronicling terrible behavior from the the protesters that were out on the street. And if you ask me, that 1.4%, those people that are just they they want to be part of a fight is the biggest problem that we have. I mean, there, you know, as many videos as we saw of ice agents pushing people around, you know, I was sent a video from somebody that I know that works downtown Minneapolis, and these protesters were busting out the windows of uh cars of these uh construction guys that were working on a construction, like 35 cars had their windows busted out. I mean, that behavior is reprehensible, but the fact that, well, and the fact that this guy did not post this video, I I gave him credit for because you post that video and all it does is throw uh fuel on a fire from that side. It just I to me, the politics uh of social media has become the biggest issue in our lives. And I want social media that brings us together, and it just doesn't seem like there's enough of it. There's not enough of the Neil Fords telling the stories. There's just not.

SPEAKER_02 40:28

Well, and it's it kind of goes back to a reminder that most of us are good people wanting just to communicate, connect with other people. It's it's not everyone's coming at you. I think people see some people come out of their out of their TV room and they they feel like someone's coming to get them. And that's not what it's really like. And that's what social media should be doing. It's like everybody relax, take a breath, get to know your neighbor, talk to your neighbor, get the story, you know.

SPEAKER_03 40:54

You know that the technologies now are it's almost as though they run themselves. And they do. And because we're not smarter and we're not wiser than previous generations, human beings are a stationary target. That is, their behavior seems chaotic and it seems unpredictable, but it's not. And algorithms figure us out, you know, digital surveillance figures us out, they monitor our keystrokes. I mean, this is what they're doing at Meta these days. All the employees are having their keystrokes monitored. Oh my god. And they're just being completely surveilled. And the the idea behind it, as I understand it, is if we can observe our staff's behavior long enough, we can replace them with a machine that will mimic their behavior. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 41:46

Yeah, my my wife was just on the horn. She placed an order with uh Instacart, and she spent an hour communicating with a machine that like use I mean, it it's they're modeling the humans to replace them.

unknown 42:03

Right.

SPEAKER_00 42:04

I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 42:05

And so that's why I love your shirts, conspiracy of kindness, because I feel like we need to be subversive.

SPEAKER_03 42:11

Yes, now let me give you an example of the sort of subversive uh treatment of AI that actually is fantastic, which is that was a story that I told because I discovered that IKEA found out that their chat bots on customer service could do roughly 40 to 60 percent of the job of a regular human being. Pretty well.

SPEAKER_01 42:33

Yeah, this is correct.

SPEAKER_03 42:34

Now, instead of laying off 40% of the staff, they took 8,500 people that would normally have performed the function that could have been done by the AI, and they said, What skills have these people acquired in doing their jobs? Well, they became really adept at the product catalog, they understood all of what we made. You know what would make sense is let's not get rid of that institutional knowledge, let's take advantage of that and give them enough training to turn them into remote design consultants who can get on the phone with somebody and talk about the various pieces of furniture that go together. Yeah, they've made a billion four off of that expansion of that program. And smart why that this this is the part where you just shake your head and go, Well, what yeah, why would you do anything else? Why not take the people in your company and instead of just cutting them off at the knees and you know throwing them out like so much garbage, you say, What is it that they've learned while here and how can I take advantage of that? And you know, it's a really it's a very well embraced service, this idea that I'm speaking to a human being about what I might do in my apartment. Got a piece, I've got a great piece of trivia for you. Um, 30% of all the kids born in Europe were conceived on an IKEA bed.

SPEAKER_00 43:56

Fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 43:57

That's quite a bit of bed.

SPEAKER_03 43:59

But you

SPEAKER_00 44:00

To your point, Ikea, you know, what IKEA did is something that we're trying to do in the medical world. You know, through some of these AI tools, the ability to uh to chart has become so much easier. And it and it and we expect it to become even that much more easier. And instead of getting rid of staff because this charting doesn't need to be done by a human as much as it used to, those humans are now being deployed to do human things, you know, connecting with people like we can provide more care. The issue is, is what especially with you know for-profit medical and and you know, senior care facilities, when you're driven by shareholders as opposed to being driven by mission, you are going to you're gonna do everything that you can to uh serve the bottom line in a financial way, where organizations that are driven by mission, they can serve the bottom line, and their bottom line is you know customer certain customer satisfaction and the care that you show with people. So all this AI stuff, there's some goodness in there as long as we don't take the human part of it out. And I mean, I think IKEA is a perfect example.

SPEAKER_02 45:16

I think though people are learning, companies are learning.

SPEAKER_00 45:18

Um, can I just shift gears? I know we've had John for quite a bit here, but I I I just want to announce that uh, and I don't know, Neil, if we talked about this, but um the organization that I that I work for, it's called Minnesota Masonic Charities, and we have a scholarship program, and I've told this story many times on the show, but for years, uh, you know, we would give out a couple million dollars a year in academic scholarships, and I would go to these different schools and pass out these big grand scholarships. And because ours tended to be some of the larger ones, by the time they got to me and my scholarship, those kids have the kids that are getting my scholarship tended to get a whole bunch of other scholarships. Uh-and they're all these real academic achievers. And God bless them, we love having academic achievers, but they're going to get academic scholarships. So we created something called the selfless scholar. And the way that this scholarship works is instead of applying for a scholarship for yourself, we encourage young people to look beyond themselves and nominate a peer for the kindness that they show for their community or for their school or for somebody specific. And if that story is selected, the scholarship reward, the, the monetary reward is split between the person who took the time to recognize that person's kindness and the person that they recognize. So there is a motivation to, you know, to find that person. And what we have found is oftentimes people will nominate somebody that they go to school with who they really don't know very well, but they've admired because of the way that they've conducted themselves. And those people have forever been connected to each other because because of the way that I treated somebody, I'm suddenly getting this uh this financial reward because somebody took the time to recognize it. Well, we just got done this past uh uh August or April 15th was our deadline, and we got like 300 some nominations. So I got to read 300 stories of kindness. I was ODing on oxytocin, and we have narrowed it down to to the number. And on for our listeners, on May 20th at uh I think six o'clock at the Masonic Heritage Center in Bloomington, Minnesota, we're going to be doing our annual scholarship night. And once again, the Kindness Chronicles crew will be on stage having these young people share stories. Uh and the fun part is we try and do it so the kids that got nominated are surprised. You know, we we encourage the nominators to try and coerce those kids to come to this evening program without telling them without telling them. And uh so for our listeners, I just want to make sure that we got that in because May 20, you know, it's free of charge. Please come and join us. It'll be a lovely night. There's going to be a lot of oxytocin rolling around. We still do academic scholarships, but the centerpiece and the the thing that's really unique are these kind of scholarships. So I just uh you know congratulations on that.

SPEAKER_03 48:25

That's a wonderful, wonderful idea.

SPEAKER_00 48:27

I like the fact that you guys got creative about it so that it's not just the it's just not the same as every and I don't know of anybody else that's doing a scholarship like this. Character, character scholarship. It's a character scholarship, but it's it's it's the kids recognizing the kindness of other kids, young people. I hate calling them kids. Why do I call them kids? Young people, young adults. Those are small goats. Kids, small goats.

SPEAKER_03 48:50

Good, good for you, though. That's that's it's very fun.

SPEAKER_00 48:53

So thank you for letting me throw that in there, getting that little plug in.

SPEAKER_02 48:57

So speaking of plugs, let's let's hear what's going on with your story, Story Fire group, right? What are you what are you doing right now? What what's what are you excited about right now that you're doing?

SPEAKER_03 49:09

Yeah, so um Story Fire is my it's a storytelling course, but it's kind of it's a little bit of a misnomer to describe it that way, even though what it does is it helps you communicate um the meaning of things, the value of things through stories. And it's so it's a terrific tool for students, it's a great tool for business people. Especially, I I want you to imagine you are a CEO and you're gonna do an earnings call. And it's really important that you be able to communicate to the the press, to the media, and to your shareholders where you're going, why you're making the decisions you're making, why the future looks bright, or maybe you have some tough decisions you have to announce. Well, you have to recognize that human beings, we haven't changed in those thousands of years from the time we were sitting around a campfire talking about how we were going to kill a bison the next morning with sharp sticks, you know, and sitting around the fire, talking, gossiping, trying to imagine what a volcano is about. Nothing has changed about how we became who we are. And it turns out that stories are the most memorable, most repeatable, and most um discernible way to take in information. And I'll give you the example I always give, which is um, I could give you five bullet points around why Story Fire is a good idea, you know, to take as a course. Um, but you won't remember any of those bullet points an hour from now. On the other hand, if you if I told you the story of the tortoise and the hare, you guys probably haven't heard the story of the tortoise and the hare in maybe nine years. And yet not only could you repeat it to me with pretty high fidelity, you could tell me what the moral was. Yeah. If you're a CEO in an earnings call and you want people to walk away with a certain piece of information and you want to have them feel a certain way about it, stories are the best way to do that. Another example that I'll give you is you know, you're a young man or a young woman on a date. You know that on a date there is that very uncomfortable silence when you don't know quite what to say. Well, if you actually prepare ahead of time with how you feel about things, stories to tell, you can see how much how cool that would be if you had right at your elbow, you know, why are you the person that you are? Who are the people you admire? What are the books you've read that influenced you? Have you seen any good movies? You see what I mean. Story Fire is about how to take all these occasions in your life and become interesting to people and to communicate well, to be more persuasive. And when you were asking me, like what I'm most excited about, I am actually just now working on an AI component to this, which is here we go, you don't just watch the videos, but it is an it's a sort of the cheerleader and a guide so that when it's time for you to start practicing, it will literally help you construct the stories. So it's like I can't scale one to one, right? Uh to coach individuals, but but the AI is basically me helping people construct these things. So I'm pretty excited about that because I'm not uh it'll be a really nice value add um for what is otherwise, you know, a very cool uh series of 27 videos that take you soup to nuts through what we learned from pitching ideas and advertising.

SPEAKER_00 52:36

And I love it, you know, along those lines, you know, what you've described, you know, like preparing for a date. We have a program called Civility School. And essentially what it is is it's for young people. And the whole idea about it is to it's important to build your personal brand. You know, we start out the program by talking about tell us about a brand that comes to mind. And they always come up with Nike, Mercedes, BMW, and they're always premium brands. And the reason uh that we encourage people to pay attention to their personal brands is when you have a premium brand, you know, you demand, you know, better scholarships, better schools, better jobs, better dates. And a big piece of that is as you've described, you know, it's important to be interesting. And a great way to be interesting is to be interested. And you know, it it do, you know, we've always talked about how it's more important to be interested than interesting, but to prepare, like what you're describing, we're always as human beings, we're selling something. We're selling ourselves and and what you've described through this program that you've put together is it's applicable to everything in your life. The way that you connect with people, the way that you you know work your way up the corporate ladder. Um, you know, being able to be a storyteller is gonna take you a long way. And I just I tell us what what's your do you have a website that we can go to?

SPEAKER_03 54:10

Yeah, yeah. If you go to uh www.storyfire.net, you know, it's like story around the campfire. Storyfire.net. Yeah, we figured that part out. Come on. I've got a I've got a uh I've got a series of uh lessons on there that are quite good and different levels of things. But you know, now that we're just I want to dig down into this thing about going on a date and and how useful it is to have your you know to kind of rehearse ahead of time. Right. Which is what what most people confront, whether they're students or young executives or what have you, is it's really hard to get up in front of people and speak. Yeah, it's it, you know, there's no time in our in our background when you know we were wearing fur skins and carrying sharpsticks when it was ever a good idea to be alone, uh unarmed, with everybody looking at you, yeah, like 200 pairs of eyes. And so, of course you've got stage fright. That's because you're normal. But the number one way to get over it is to be ready. And then what happens is you have a very different kind of nerves. It's not the sort of nerves where, oh my god, this is gonna be a disaster. It's instead, it's that sort of excitement which is would they just let me start talking? I've got to get this out of here. How good is this gonna be? And I have seen, um, I've seen, you know, in the executive suites, I have watched live careers get made by how they did in front of a a group of 3,000 car dealers.

unknown 55:42

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 55:42

When when a person gets up there and just owns the room, all of a sudden everybody goes, Who is that? It can be a it can be a magnificent um career enhancement tool. And you know, I've I've seen it with say engineers and chemists and financial analysts, you know, who are sometimes on the spectrum when you can really coach them up to put on a compelling presentation. Man, the benefits to their self-esteem and to their performance and their employers are now incredibly tickled. So you're not wrong though, it's it's applicable to everyone, but in my personal case, I found that careers are often made by your ability to communicate colorfully, vividly. What and go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 56:31

What what I think is the greatest thing about all this is that you've intertwined kindness and you have a subversive conspiracy of kindness, like we talked about, like you mentioned, uh, of subverting that to showing people the benefit of getting to know someone or actually taking a minute to talk to someone, listen to one, and connecting with someone. That I love that you're you're sort of uh entwined that into your persuasive understanding of what you know selling is, and it's it's my favorite part about what you're doing.

SPEAKER_00 57:06

Okay, I have an idea. Yeah, it just came to me. And I'm wondering if if I could uh if if we could hire Neil Ford to come to so Neil, at our uh the one of our facilities, we've got this beautiful 500 seat uh jewel box theater, okay? Oh, and you know, we have plays and all this stuff there, and you know, great stand-up comedians aren't joke tellers, they are storytellers. Yeah, yeah. And I'm wondering, you know, how often do people like Neil Ford have an audience to just hear them tell stories that give you goosebumps? And do you do that? I mean, do you have a set? Do you do you speak in front of people? And you know, I have access to funds to to to bring in speakers and stuff like that. Wow. And I would love to have you come and talk about kindness for an hour and a half at our at our theater.

SPEAKER_03 58:03

Yeah, you know, in fact, I do have sale right now.

SPEAKER_02 58:06

You are, you are, yeah, persuading.

SPEAKER_03 58:08

Yeah, it's called the ROI of kindness. And what it what it tries to persuade people of is that you will get so much further in the world if you are conscious of other people's needs and feelings and desires. And you you go out into the world like a shepherd, like a ladder, like a lifeboat. That your mission is not to accomplish things for yourself, but rather to see how far, what what kind of good you can do today. Let me give you an example of the sort of thing for that how that manifests in business. So you have a client, they're coming over, you're gonna try and sell them something. Maybe it's an ad, maybe it's a program of insurance, you know, what have you. The number one priority you need to have going into that meeting is this is going to be the best meeting of their week. So you go in competitively, I'm gonna make sure they have more fun, this is more uh responsive to their needs, this is more um this they walk out feeling good, and they they even talk about the meeting afterwards. If you just go in like that, you are already so far ahead of everyone else. What you've done is essentially you've said, I want this meeting to be a gift. And yeah, that takes a little bit of investment of energy and it takes a little time, and you got to be creative. But I promise you, what's gonna happen is you're gonna get addicted to that feeling when they walk out of that room and go, that was amazing. And just to go back to the ROI for a second, I've personally had this experience many times where they didn't buy what you came to sell them, and there was some kind of hitch, and there was a reason, and you know, they didn't buy it. But when you do meetings like that, they walk out feeling like they owe you one. In other words, there you go. If it's close next time, they'll give it to you. Yep. Now that that is a kind of that's part of the chapter and verse that I sing on the ROI of kindness is to say, let's talk about some of the cool meetings that we've had and the the amount of fun that you can have by um celebrating uh the fact that we're spending time together each day. You know, I'm not just here to think of you as a sheep to be fleeced. I'm trying to build a relationship here. So what am I gonna do? I'm gonna make the whole meeting a gift. I'm gonna take the time and energy. But back to your earlier point, I would love to come out and fill an hour. Um and well, we're looking for an hour and 20.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:47

We're looking for an hour and 20 minutes so we can have a little uh hour and 20. I can do it. But uh Steve Brown here is my booking agent. So okay. And we'd like to do it um in the middle of winter. No, I'm teasing. We wouldn't do that to uh uh Angelino. Is that is that how you refer to Los Angeles people? But in all sincerity, you know, we've got this great resource, and you know, people are like, you know, we should get some stand-up comedians. And it's like, I think what we need is some like kindness TED Talk kind of people that can come in and the ROI of kindness, I could see it already. This is gonna come together.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:25

Let's brainstorm, but we'll get back to Mr. Ford.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:27

Yeah, you can negotiate with him.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:29

I just love that you joined us on our 200th episode. This is a big deal for us. Most podcasts don't make it past eight episodes. This is our fifth year.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:39

Yeah, fifth year.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:40

Fifth year to be congratulated for sure. And we we've obviously stepped up and done different things since we talked to you last. Jeff has joined us. It's been way more involved. And now we have video and we have a YouTube channel that we look on on video. It's always fun. It's just been a joy to be able to do this and to have you back is uh just a gift as well. So thank you very much. And uh we'll be watching you on LinkedIn on all the all the social media to find the good stuff, the oxytocin, and try to spread that stuff around. And we'll be in touch. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:10

Right on. All right. Thank you so much for having me again. And you know, when you're your three hundredth, I hope I'll be on the off we go.